How to combat air pollution and make your home healthier

And breathe: Xand van Tulleken has ditched cleaning products and candles at his London homeAKIRA SUEMORI

With each new year, it seems the UK is plagued with a new health crisis — there’s childhood obesity and binge drinking, type 2 diabetes and the mountains of plastic entering our seas. But one threat has been around for far too long: air pollution cuts short the lives of about 50,000 Brits every year, and the government is in breach of its legal obligation to deal with it.

Creating a physical barrier between yourself and the traffic is one of the cheapest, most effective — and attractive — ways to stop toxic gases and particles from reaching youALAMY

As a doctor with a background in public health, I should know better than most the effects of this invisible threat, but the problem is so insidious that I rarely gave it a second thought. I blithely cycled around the capital, breathing in litres of colourless, odourless toxic fumes and particles that wreaked havoc on nearly…

Want to read more?

Subscribe now and get unlimited digital access on web and our smartphone and tablet apps, free for your first month.